Matchstick
by ShiningSugar14
Summary: AU, as always. They all used to burn things together. Now Shelke can't stop. WeissNeroShelke. Yes, that's all three of them together.
1. Chapter 1

This idea smacked me out of nowhere, but it was influenced by many things including Stephen King's (masterpiece) "Firestarter," Laurie Halse Anderson's (magnum opus) "Wintergirls," and Patricia McCormick's "Cut." I highly recommend all three of them. PS: BriKyo, this isn't your gift.

Copyright Disclaimer: I don't own any of the copyrighted materials in this fic.

Cruelty Disclaimer: Weiss, Nero and Shelke are all highly disturbed individuals in this fic. As such, they are committing very cruel/disturbing acts. I, as the authoress and a person, do not endorse what they do.

* * *

Matchstick

On my first day sitting on that uncomfortable fake leather couch, the therapist tells me to recall my first memory of fire. I actually have to sift backwards quite a few years before I find what I am looking for. I remember Shalua, at age 11, with chocolate something-or-other smeared around her mouth, and I remember a white cake with plastic balloons and bright sprinkles. The candles on top gleamed in the dark room and I had blown them out, all six of them.

I remember more about that encounter, like my mother harshly instructing Shalua to go wash her face and receiving a toy laptop that remained my companion until its warranty died, but I don't mention those. After all, I'm only supposed to be discussing my issue. Any more than that and it's coming out of my almost-empty pocket, rather than the court's.

So I go through the idiocy with the cake. When I ask why she wanted me to remember that, she says that my first memory of fire is linked to my later "obsessions" and that the memory will be good for therapy. I tell her that she is the crazy one (even though, technically, I'm not crazy either) here if she thinks that my remembering my sixth birthday will solve anything.

* * *

They still hang around here. Never mind any locked doors and never mind any sort of logic. They sit up on the counters while I'm in the kitchen, lounge on the adjacent couch when I'm in the living room, sit around on my bed while I'm at my desk, and lean against the wall while I'm drifting off to sleep.

* * *

She makes me recall, and I'm seriously quoting here, "The trigger moment." I raise my eyebrows at that and lean back into her fake leather couch.

"You mean the moment it started?" She nods. "Because it didn't just start. It grew over time."

"And when did it start growing, Shelke? When do you think your obsession started?"

So I close my eyes and begin visualizing.

_There was a smoky grey sky overhead, the smell of rain on asphalt digging at my insides, the sound of my sneakers carrying me across the wet pavement and two figures huddled around a rock. I was used to people smoking out by the rocks, and there was smoke coming out of their little two-person circle, but I had wandered over anyway. _

_A dark-haired man, maybe a few years older than me, held his hand over the cover of a smoke-filled mason jar. The taller of the two, a man with platinum hair and a long overcoat, watched with increasing satisfaction as what was inside beat its body against the sides. _

_"What is it?" _

_"A moth," the dark-haired one answered. "And a few sheets of paper." _

That was my trigger moment: Watching Weiss and Nero Eldritch burn paper in the same jar as a moth in order to suffocate the moth to death.

* * *

"Have fun in therapy?"

"I never have fun there." I don't pursue the subject further. The cabinets aren't empty, but they're getting there. I need to make a food run pretty soon.

Weiss saunters out of the living room. He joins Nero on the counter and watches me dig through the small amount of food available to me. Since they are not welcome guests, I don't offer them something to eat. Something tells me they wouldn't take it anyway.

I examine the yellow notebook on the table. My assignment is to record everything I can think of that might link to my fire setting. Ignoring the men sitting on my counter, I scrounge around for a pen and sit down at the kitchen table.

"This is pointless," headlines the first page in my block handwriting. Weiss chuckles darkly. I cut a glare to him. Try again, his expression says. I flip the page and begin writing again.

_

* * *

_

The second time I ever saw Weiss and Nero burn anything was during my senior year of high school. I still didn't know their names or anything similar. I was late, an extremely rare occurrence, and I was running up past the rocks. Something about the apparent urgency of their conversation slowed my pace.

_"No mason jars today?" _

_Nero, though I didn't know him as such yet, was the one to turn and say hello. "No, actually. Mugs from home." He held one up as proof. There was smoke coming out of it and it smelled like paper. "We're not doing harm to any innocent moths today." _

_"Good." _

_"Speaking of good, shouldn't you be in school? Like a good girl?" Weiss stuck his hands into his pockets. _

_I didn't really have anything to say to that, because it was a sort of trap. If I said that I was on my way to school, which I was, then I'd be proving him right and I didn't want to do that. Something about him looked like he was proved right far too often. If I said that I wasn't... Well, what if? _

_"I'm not," I lie. _

_"Then you have some free time? Or do you have an appointment?" _

_We were heading into dangerous territory because I was still a "vulnerable young woman," to quote my mother. _

_"What did you have in mind?" _

_"Sitting around out here, tearing up paper and burning it." _

_It wasn't exactly fun, nor would it be warm in the middle of November, but I couldn't think of a better way to spend a school day. _

_I learned a lot after that first day, aside from just their names. _

_Weiss didn't burn anything himself. He got the matches, he got the gasoline, and he dictated what was to be burned, but he didn't actually do it. Nero did, going through the motions for him. Even though it sounds sort of bad, as if Weiss was making Nero burn things for him, Nero took his own pleasure from it too. _

_Since I spent almost the entire day outside of school, I only managed to get to one class. I liked chemistry a lot, as it turned out. I never would have guessed, considering how forcefully and subtly my parents steered me towards computers. Combustion reactions, as I learned, were interesting. _

* * *

My confession takes a little more than a page. I set the pen down and my wrist pulses. I am not used to writing that much by hand.

"Time for a break," Nero croons. Feebly, I shake my head. Instead, Weiss tears a sheet of paper from the notebook, the piece that says, "This is pointless" across the top, and gets the matches that I'm technically not supposed to have in the house. Nero gently restrains me in my chair by keeping his hands on my shoulders. Weiss sets the match between my fingers and helps me strike it.

"Ready?"

It's five days until my next appointment. The words are eaten after I've read the sentence along the top 33 times.

* * *

The first thing I do when I wake up the next morning is sit down by the notebook and start writing. Weiss makes coffee and Nero rubs my shoulders.

_

* * *

_

I was locked out of the house once. I had forgotten my keys at home and realized it the second I got there. Mom was a doctor and dad was a CEO, so it wasn't like I could call home and ask one of them to unlock the door for me. Shalua was already in college, living in a dorm somewhere upstate. So I figured that all I could do was wander town for a while.

_Weiss and Nero found me an hour after I left my house. _

_"And what are we doing, Shelke? Out on the town?" I swung around and, sure enough, they were in an alleyway. Nero had a cigarette dangling from his fingers and Weiss had one in his mouth. _

_"Just wandering around." My response was guarded, I remember. _

_Weiss watched the ashes that Nero flicked off the end of his cigarette fall down to the ground. _

_"Were you going anywhere in particular?" _

_"No. Just walking to the gas station." The gas station was on a busy street and I knew the man who ran it. If nothing else, he would let me loiter around his shop until one of my parents called. _

_"The gas station..." Weiss caught Nero's eye. "We need new lighters anyway, Nero." _

_Nero nodded, as if this was a normal item on their pick-up list. As normal as milk or bread is on my family's grocery list. "We do." _

_They followed me to the gas station, staying a few feet behind me. Every time I heard a lascivious hiss from any dark, urban corridor, one of them said something back and I won't hear another word. _

* * *

The process of writing it out drains me. I'm seriously tired again after scrawling it all down. Nero and Weiss read it over my shoulder. Weiss is his usual silent self and saunters off to the living room to lounge around. Nero stays behind. I always was closer to him.

"It's good."

"Shut up." I hate how close I am to him.

"Really. I like how you're documenting it all. Tell me, though, when will you talk about the first time you burned?"

I blink and my fingers twitch towards the pen. Then I remember how barren my cupboards are. "After I go get food."

"Ah... Go on, then. Weiss and I will be here when you get back." He chuckles darkly.

It's not funny.

* * *

On my way to the grocery store, I see that they're still cleaning up the building Weiss and Nero lived in. The residual carbon sticks to the bricks, staining it. I know that it's not a permanent stain, but it looks like it. Just looking at it makes me feel sort of sick. Even when they knock down the foundation and rebuild a new apartment building over it, I'm still going to feel like it's stained with smog.

* * *

In the store, as I'm checking out, I see Weiss by the front counter, observing the lighters in a box.

_

* * *

_

"Feel like burning something?"

_The question caught me off guard, but I should have expected it, walking past this particular alley at this particular time of evening. _Did_ I feel like burning something? On one hand I had nowhere else to go, no expectations dragging me off to this or that area of town. I could, technically, go wherever I wanted to. On the other hand, these were men I barely knew and I already knew that men could take advantage of girls when they got them into alleyways or apartments. I gave them a wary eye. _

_Nero basically read my thoughts, which was vaguely unnerving. "Shelke, if we were perverts, we would have already had several chances to drag you off. We simply want to be friends."_

_I'd already decided that I wanted to go with them. I had questions that I wanted to ask. Instead of actually saying that, though, I nodded. Weiss dropped his cigarette, which he didn't take a single drag off from, and grounds it out under his boot. Nero gestured for me to enter the building to my left. _

_The apartment building I entered was not high-class. It wasn't even middle-class, to be honest. It was really dirty, and there was graffiti all along the walls. Nero wasn't put off by that and ushered me along as if we were in the Hilton. Weiss trailed along behind us until Nero unlocked one particular door and strode right in. _

_There were thousands to choose from, but if I had to pick a single adjective for the room, it would be barren. There was nothing on the walls. There was nothing on the floors, save for ripped bits of paper. Everything smelled burnt, but there wasn't a single black mark on anything. A few parts of the walls were discolored from smoke, but that was a yellow-brown stain, rather than a black one. _

_"Do you burn everything as a hobby?" _

_Weiss raised an eyebrow. "No. It's more of a career." _

_"How is it a career?" _

_Nero made the "Keep-Mum" sign. "Don't ask, don't tell, Shelke." Probably something I should have expected. _

_We settled into the living room with a bowl, a thick sheaf of paper, a little can of fluid, and a book of matches. Nero moved to work with the materials first, but Weiss stopped him. _

_"We invited Shelke up here to do this." _

_Nero nodded. "My apologies, Shelke." He passed the materials to me. I must have looked completely clueless because Nero continued. "Weiss will walk you through it." _

_"Pour some of the lighter fluid into the bowl first and tear up the paper to soak it in the stuff. After it's properly soaked, toss the lit match in." I did as I was told, but I talked to them while I worked._

_"You know, I've been reading about fire setting in the psych books at school." _

_"Really?" _

_"The books say it's a sign of being molested as a child." Nero calmly looked at Weiss over my shoulder as I ripped up more paper. _

_There was silence, save for the ripping noises of the paper. Then Weiss broke it. "I was six. It was our... I believe our godfather. The first time father sold me, right?" He said that as if it was just another family story he needed assistance in recalling. _

_Nero nodded. I struck a match and watched the fire eat the cardboard. "Your first time was six with our uncle. I was four, and I think it was the babysitter." He continued in the same tone. _

_I tossed the match in and watched the flames rise up, level with my ribcage. "I was five years old. It was my uncle." _

* * *

I find my hand shaking after that one. Nero and Weiss read over it.

"That was personal, you know."

"We assumed that telling you in confidence meant that you would keep it in confidence."

My stomach growls. The Cup-Ramen in the cupboard beckons. "You never told me to keep it to myself. Besides, this is therapy."

"If you think it will help you, Shelke."

Weiss laughs at him. "Nothing will help."

* * *

I work in a normal place, because the first thing my therapist told me before I said anything else was to get into a normal, non-stressful environment. Even though I'm "gifted academically," I won't be running off to college for another year or so because that counts as "stressful." Instead, I work as a secretary because I type faster than anybody else and Shalua has connections in this company.

It's boring. I type a lot of letters, mostly replies to irritated people about this-or-that defective product. I type a lot of things that aren't really lies, but aren't as sincere as I make them sound. "We're very sorry that you experienced a failed piece of our equipment," is a line that I almost want to just copy-paste onto all the letters. "Please consider buying our products again," is another.

They both do it, but Weiss drops by the workplace frequently. He doesn't say anything, doesn't comment on what I'm doing. He just sits in a chair, the chair furthest from the door to the office, and flicks his butane lighter on and off.

_

* * *

_

My first kiss was a rape of my lips by a slick and unwanted tongue in a closet during my sixth birthday. The first time I ever kissed someone of my own volition was a year ago in a rat-lit (as opposed to candlelit) room while I was supposed to be in school.

_Nero padded out of the bathroom with a tattered bathrobe and a rat grasped in his hand by its tail. His eyes called for sacrifice, and he dug around in their cupboard for something to work with. I wanted to tell him, "Don't kill it," but he'd already trapped it up in a plastic aquarium with a series of tealights burning along the bottom. It was only a matter of time before it caught fire. _

_"That was particularly cruel," Weiss said as he came through the door with groceries and whiffs of fresh air. The smell in here was completely unbearable. Weiss enjoyed getting out of the apartment and cleansing his pallet for the next burning. "What happened?" _

_"It was in the shower while I was in there." As I'd learned, Nero valued his privacy immensely. _

_"Disgusting," Weiss said as he proceeded to unload the bags. I sat up at the dining room table and watched him unpack. They valued each other's conversation, and I valued silence. "Aren't you supposed to be in school, Shelke?" _

_I nodded at the clock that read 1:25. The words that didn't tumble out of my mouth went something like, 'Yes, I'm supposed to be in school. I'm supposed to be in Health class, learning about what drugs not to take.' Instead, what came out was "Aren't you supposed to be at work?" _

_"Called in sick. They don't mind when I do that, since I take such pleasure in my work. Nero, however..." _

_"I'm due to go in twenty minutes. It's why I was showering." With that, Nero walked out to get dressed. Weiss got a ceramic mug and some paper. He offered it to me and I shook my head. He shrugged, and went through the motions. _

_There are no words. We didn't need words in those situations, where the smell of burned flesh blended with burned paper, turning my lungs black. We didn't need to do anything except watch everything burn. _

_Eventually, though, Weiss added words. "We're not normal, Shelke. You and Nero and I aren't normal." _

_"I know." _

_"Completely fucked up." _

_Weiss was so much older than I was, but that didn't stop him from taking hold of my chin and pulling me up to kiss his lips. The paper, lighter than air at this point, tried to enter into the kiss. The smoke succeeded and filled my nose. It was quick and noninvasive, but sent chills down my back. _

* * *

Weiss laughs as he reads over the last part. Nero chuckles too. When did he get here?

"We're not normal, Shelke."

"Keep going, darling." Nero pats my head. "Keep burning things for us, okay?"

* * *

TBC

I sense an imminent bodyslam on Shelke's characterization. I just do.


	2. Chapter 2

I was absolutely terrified about this fic, but it's been well-received. Glee!!!

Copyright Disclaimer: I don't own any of the copyrighted materials in this fic.

Cruelty Disclaimer: Weiss, Nero and Shelke are all highly disturbed individuals in this fic. As such, they are committing very cruel/disturbing acts. I, as the authoress and a person, do not endorse what they do.

* * *

Matchstick

In the next two days, Weiss and Nero are quietly restless. They do not invade my living space, but I hear them quietly murmuring outside my doors. I don't see them at all, but instead find small signs that they've been there. A sunken couch cushion here, an unattended coffee pot there, and the smell of matches and paper.

Consequently, I have nothing to write about. When they aren't around, I don't think about fire. So, when I go to the therapist, I only have four sorry little entries to show for all her "hard work" and "dedication." She tells me it's fine, that not many people come out with everything on the first try, and asks me to talk.

My mind blanks. I'm good at conversing, as long as the topic is already established. The therapist crosses her legs and tries again.

"Lets go back to why you're here, Shelke."

To be of sound mind and body so the state will leave me alone, but that response won't be well received if I voice it. I would lose points due to a negative outlook. Instead, I churn out a response that would be received better.

"Because I want to stop thinking about fire all the time."

She nods, a good sign. Then we talk about things. I'm supposed to be "exploring my issues" according to the courts, but I have no issues to discuss that aren't written out in the notebook. Instead, we talk about my job and how living alone is. Overall, aside from dropping off the journal, I think this meeting was a waste of the state's money.

* * *

I can't sleep. I got into bed around 10 or so and the green lights of my alarm clock blink 3 AM at me. If I were younger, I'd probably be able to reassure myself that I can sleep for a few hours but I'm older and wide awake. I'm not going to sleep tonight. Instead, I get up and start my day three hours in advance.

After I start my coffee, I turn my attention to the living room and Nero is laying on the couch. His feet are up, something I've always told him to refrain from doing, and he's staring outside.

"Good morning, Shelke." I don't respond, focusing on what I need to do next. Start breakfast, I suppose. A bagel gets into the toaster and the lever is pressed down. I go to the living room to tell Nero to get out of here. "Sit with me."

Rather than protest, I do as he says and we sit in silence for a few minutes. "You're having trouble sleeping again?" He chuckles as my body sags against the couch. "I recall a time when you wouldn't sleep anywhere except the apartment. Do you recall those days, Shelke?"

I go get the notebook and ignore the bagel slowly turning into a black crisp in the toaster.

* * *

_There was a period during which I was afflicted with a special sort of insomnia. I couldn't sleep at home. I'd fall asleep in school and that presented problems. I was told that if I fell asleep in class one more time, the guidance counselors would speak to my parents. I'm certain they meant well, but I couldn't let that happen. My unexcused absences would be brought up as well. _

_So, on the fourth night that I couldn't sleep, I decided to go somewhere that I was almost certain I could sleep; Weiss' and Nero's apartment. I don't know why I was under the impression that I'd be able to sleep there. The same reason that I know to drink lots of water when I'm sick, I suppose. _

"_I can't sleep."_

_Weiss, the same Weiss that had kissed me three days ago, blearily stared at me. "Alright." He didn't question that sort of thing. I'd seen people come to Weiss with the oddest statements and he took them in stride. This isn't really odd though. _

_"I don't think I can sleep anywhere else but here." _

_"So you want to sleep here?" _

_"I want to try." _

_Weiss shrugged and opened the door wider so that I could enter. I had my backpack with toiletries in with my pencils. I was wearing my clothes for school because the jeans and sweatshirt were so much bigger than me that it didn't matter if I slept in them or not. I headed for the couch but Weiss stopped me with a gentle hand to the shoulder (surprisingly gentle for a man with his muscles) and shook his head. _

_"Nero has the graveyard shift. You can use his bed." He followed me in and reprogrammed Nero's alarm clock (which had been flashing 12:00 AM ever since I arrived, and probably a long time before that). "Out of curiosity, where do your parents think you are?" _

_"Safe in bed. At home." I didn't have to tell him that they work late, or that my mother was probably on-call and asleep in the hospital or that my father was probably out with his secretary. I didn't need to tell Weiss this because, not only was he perfectly aware of it, but he didn't care. He told me that there are worse things in the world besides infidelity and workaholism. Loss of passion, ignorance, letting the corrupted go unscarred, to quote him. _

_"Poor naïve souls." He chuckled. The clock was set at 2:32 AM. "Nero might be back around 4. If he tells you to get out of his bed, tell him the situation and tell him to sleep in my bed." I nodded and crawl under the sheets and blankets exhaustedly. "Good night." He didn't try to kiss me again, or hold me, or anything like that. Not that I expected him to be romantic. I fell asleep almost immediately. _

_My dreams, if I had any, must have been either nightmares or disconcerting visions, because I distinctly remember waking up with an uneasy feeling. 6:30 AM gleamed from the nightstand, accompanied by a shrill beeping sound, akin to almost all alarm clocks. A sound that might have been a groan of pain issued from behind me. Nero was lying behind me in the long-sleeved shirt and pants that I had come to associate as his "work clothes." _

_"Shelke," he yawned as I reached to shut the clock off, "Why are you getting up this early when the school is ten minutes away?" _

_Because I usually need to make breakfast and get all my homework together, along with catching a bus that doesn't drop me off at the school until half an hour before my first class or half an hour after class started. But the apartment building was so close to the school that I could see the clock tower from the window. Without a suitable answer, I shook my head. _

_"It doesn't matter." He stretched his hands towards the ceiling and let them crawl back under the blankets. "Go back to sleep for a while, alright?" _

_It wasn't difficult to acquiesce with his request. _

My arm throbs when I'm finished. Nero is up and throwing away the bagel that burned. "You're going to be late you know."

* * *

Considering that I was twenty minutes late to work, it's understandable that I'm still in working late. Later than anyone else, including my boss. I think the only people here are the janitors and our sole security man. The company has a lot of failed products out, all of which need to have perfectly sincere letters typed out, printed out and painstakingly addressed (by hand, because labels give the mail a cold, industrial feel, which not what the company wants). Not that I mind. More money in my pocket, plus it keeps me away from the home that keeps getting broken into.

Maybe I should get a new apartment. Weiss and Nero can't have keys for every apartment in the city. I'll start looking tomorrow. A janitor comes in to start cleaning the floors. I should really leave soon. I log off the computer and lean down to gather my purse. When I look up, I notice that the janitor is messing with the smoke alarm directly above my desk by standing on my desk. Then I notice that it's not a janitor.

"Working the late shift again, Shelke?" Weiss removes the batteries from the smoke alarm and tucks them into the pocket of his coat. I'm completely speechless. How did he get in here? "I've been there too." He hops off the desk and saunters around to my side. "But you don't enjoy your work as much as I do, do you?"

My right hand goes digging through my bag to find my notebook because I just remembered how Weiss would always take away the batteries of the smoke alarms before lighting anything he could. He'd usually hand them to Nero but, if Nero wasn't there, he'd put them in his pocket and hop off from whatever chair he had been using, in the exact same way he just jumped off my desk.

"Are you looking for your journal? It's at home, Shelke. You can't ignore us by hiding your face in there forever, you know."

My jaw, which was paralyzed in shock, unhinges. "Leave me alone."

He scoffs and produces a ceramic coffee mug from the employee's lounge. "That would be really simple for you, if we left you alone, wouldn't it? You could be normal, or at least pretend." Weiss takes a piece of blank printer paper from the printer on my left and starts shredding it up. I know what's coming, but I also know that I can't make him stop.

I start thinking about the other smoke alarms, how they'll go off and the real janitor who works here will find him, but Weiss seems to read my mind. He digs into his pocket and reveals several more sets of batteries. He's already taken care of it. He's already thought of everything.

"Do you remember what I told you, Shelke? We're not normal. You and Nero and I… There's something distorted about us. It's just how we are. And you can't escape something that deep inside you." He takes a permanent marker and scribbles on the last few strips, as a substitute for gasoline.

"I can change. I can get away from you."

He laughs. When Weiss used to laugh about what I said, it made me feel accepted. Now it makes me sick. "You can't get away from us. We're part of you." It's mostly the last part that makes me want to be very, very sick. It's not the fact that he said it, because he used to say heavy things like that with a casual air all the time. It's the fact that too much has changed.

I wait for him to drop a lit match into the paper, but he leaves the mug neat on my desk with a tiny box of matches next to it. "Good luck."

* * *

There's a message from my parents on the phone when I come back home. Nothing long or drawn out, just telling me to call them back whenever I can. I delete the message and rub at my shoulder. I know they want to discuss my therapy, but they're very inconsistent on the manner: Half of the time, they want to know everything, but the other half, they're very happy being in the dark.

From what I understand, Shalua told them almost everything. They know I'm in therapy, they know it's required for another two months. They also know the things Shalua didn't tell them, and those are the things that had occurred in their own homes. The containers that had "just broken" were charred, melted or stacked up along the back of my closet were discovered shortly after I moved out, but there was no explanation for them at the time. Three months later, they got the call that I was in court from Shalua.

They don't know anything else. They don't know about Weiss, or Nero, or the countless burnings before the "Big One," as Weiss and Nero had called it. They don't know about the forest, or treks I took out there, or the island that Rosso had taken me to. They don't know about how flesh smells when it's burning.

* * *

On my next therapy day, she says that she read the notebook. My stomach twists when I hear that. How well did she read it? How much of it? Obviously, all of it, but there's still a faint glimmer of hope that she didn't.

"Weiss and Nero Eldritch are triggers for your issue, aren't they, Shelke?"

"I suppose so. I always just assumed that fire itself was a trigger for more fire."

She shakes her head. "No, it's very possible that you could have gone your whole life without setting a single thing on fire the way you do, if you hadn't met them." There's a pause, like she's trying to let the information sink in. "Or, you might have wound up picking this up on your own, and Weiss and Nero are completely inconsequential.

"But, Shelke?" I look up from counting corners on the carpet's pattern. "There must have been a shifting point between November and your trial in February. Something changed between those two points in time. What was it?"

"I… Don't remember. I can't really recall."

She nods, like she's heard this before. "You will remember, eventually. When you do, I'd like you to write it down. I'm going to check up on where these two are and see if they can come in for one of your sessions."

I recall Weiss' disdain for the process and Nero's amusement. I don't think it's a good idea, if only because it would be counter-productive, but that doesn't stop me from saying, "Go ahead."

* * *

The instant that I get through the door, I remember the trigger moment. It hits me with all the subtly of a car coming through the wall. Ignoring the men sitting on my couch, I drop everything except the notebook by the door and lock myself into my room. Even though they're sitting in the next room, I can still smell the burning fur and flesh of something that might have been alive twenty minutes ago.

* * *

_There was a bonfire during December. It was supposed to be some kind of pep rally. Yuffie, an acquaintance who seemed to think we were friends, had gotten me to come along with her because she was interested in seeing a guy and she was going along with friends anyway but she wanted me to come along with her. _

_So I stood there, watching people put cardboard and wood onto the pile. Everyone around me was talking and giggling, joking about pouring gasoline onto the fire to make it even bigger. I twist my face into disdain. Everyone calls themselves "pyromaniacs" when faced with a fire. But, really, how many of them have done this daily? _

_While absorbed into my thoughts as to whether or not to spend another night over with Weiss and Nero, someone screamed really loudly, "It just ate that whole piece whole!" and someone scoffed behind me. _

_"Trench effect," the arrogant tone drawled. I spun around and there were Weiss and Nero, standing all of ten feet away, staring directly at me. I'm not sure if they didn't need them or if they were actually obeying the law for once, but neither of them had lit cigarettes between their fingers or in their mouths. I checked to see if Yuffie would miss me- She wouldn't, for a while- before I headed over to them. _

_We watched the fire rise and crackle. It was completely different from the apartment because it's so loud. We were quiet when we burned. The students were frenzied. _

_After a while, it irritated Weiss, like I knew it would. "These people are ruining it for me." _

_"Kill them then." Weiss sneered at Nero. _

_"That's not my job."_

_I take the opportunity to speak. "What are you two doing here?" _

_"Watching the fun."_

_"Admittedly, we could have just watched the whole thing from Weiss' bedroom window, but there's no fun in that." _

_"You know that's not what I meant. You were watching something other than the bonfire." They got into a sort of trance state when they watched fires. They wouldn't notice the ignorance of some other person unless it managed to extinguish the fire. _

_"Perhaps." _

_"What were you watching?" _

_"You." Nero said it like I had asked him who was speaking to him; As if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "My turn: What were you thinking about while you were watching the fire?" _

_"…" _

_Weiss grinned. "I think I know. It was one of us, wasn't it?" _

_"It was both of you. I… I need to borrow your couch or something again. I can't sleep in my house anymore." _

_"Then sleep in our home, wherever you'd like. We don't mind, do we, Weiss?" _

_"Not at all," Weiss murmured. He was watching the fire. We wouldn't have him back for a while. _

_"Delightful. We'll be happy to have you, Shelke." Nero ran the back of his hand along my cheek. I really wasn't surprised by that- as he was the more intimate of the two- but I was surprised when he leaned down and kissed me. It was a bit longer than the one Weiss gave me, but he did pull away. _

_"Shall we expect you later tonight, or will you come along now?" _

_"I'll be there later." _

_"We'll stay up for you." _

_Aside from going to get clothes every few days, and the occasional night my parents came home (which they always called ahead to tell me not to make my own dinner), I don't think I returned home until February. _

* * *

I go to bed that night, having taken two Benadryl along with my Seroxat. Under the covers, everything is extremely quiet. There's no noise on the street outside, no extremely loud couple upstairs. Everything is a blissful silence. For two minutes, I honestly think that I'll be able to sleep.

A click on the other side of the room prevents my sleep and I sit upright. In the faint, orange light of the street lamp outside, I recognize Weiss and Nero's figures, leaning against the door.

"Get out."

They don't answer. Instead, they approach the bed, where I'm still sitting.

"Dear, you have no idea how much we'd like to sometimes." Nero drags his index finger along my cheekbone and I jerk away from the touch.

"Don't touch me." He removes his hand and shakes his head. Weiss has already circled around to one side of my bed. Nero is standing on the other side. "It's so cold, Shelke," he breathes.

I open my mouth to tell him to get out again, but an arm wraps itself around my waist. I swivel around and see Weiss' exhausted form lying there, already nearly asleep. Nero climbs in on my other side, sliding his arm above Weiss' and effectively packed in between them.

"You can't escape us," Nero croons. "We're always going to be here." He kisses the top of my head and I want to shove him away but I can't move.

* * *

"I've checked up on what we discussed during the last meeting."

I would respond, but I didn't get much sleep last night. Or the last three nights. Ever since the first time, Weiss and Nero have taken to sleeping in my bed every night. As such, I don't sleep, out of fear.

"Yes, and?"

"Well… Shelke… I would have really imagined you would know this by now. With the way that you said it was okay for me to search for them."

"What?"

"Shelke, Weiss and Nero Eldritch are dead."

* * *

TBC, because I couldn't forgive myself if I let this fic hang here forever.

The second to last scene, with them getting into bed with her, was pure complicated wrapped in a "Toe the line" candy coating. On one hand, I wanted that scene to happen, just to truly creep Shelke out. On the other hand, Weiss and Nero can't be cuddly about it and Shelke genuinely CAN NOT want them there with her, but too much protesting would have sounded fake…

I listened to a lot of The Dresden Dolls while writing a lot of this. I had gotten a bunch of ideas into a Notepad file, but when I started writing from the scene in Shelke's workplace and onwards, I constantly had The Dresden Dolls in my ear. During the last three or so scenes, I had "Lonesome Organist Rapes Page-Turner" on repeat.

EDIT: I went back and fixed a formatting error that I noticed and a typo pointed out by ReadingChick.


	3. Chapter 3

Super awesome THANK YOU's go out to BriKyo and my epic Livejournal crew (you know who you are) with special thanks to **ReadingChick** for motivating my lazy arse with promises of another WeissNeroShelke. GLEE.

Copyright Disclaimer: I don't own any of the copyrighted materials in this fic.

Cruelty Disclaimer: Weiss, Nero and Shelke are all highly disturbed individuals in this fic. As such, they are committing very cruel/disturbing acts. I, as the authoress and a person, do not endorse what they do.

* * *

"How can they be dead? I've…"

The therapist folds her hands in her lap and looks at me with sympathetic eyes. "Shelke, according to the newspaper, they died shortly after your conviction. I can't believe that you wouldn't know about this." She leans forward. "What's going on, Shelke?"

I can't be seeing ghosts for multiple reasons, first and foremost being that they don't exist. Therefore, I must be delusional, but I'm not crazy either. Instead, I tell her, "I'm not crazy."

"I know you're not. You're scared and maybe a bit distressed, but I don't think you're crazy." In my mind, the words "distressed" and "disturbed" are a bit too close together for my tastes. She hands me back my notebook. "Keep going, Shelke. Keep writing for me, okay?"

Her words are too close to Nero's. I take my notebook and leave before either of them get to make an appearance.

* * *

"Weiss! Nero! Get out here!" My voice cracks because it isn't used to being that loud, but I still hear a response- a low, disinterested "Hm?"- from my living room. Weiss is sprawled out on the couch. "Weiss, I want you out of here."

"No." He nuzzles his face into a throw-pillow, as if he's trying to tune me out. Anger boils up under my skin, but if my voice cracks again, he won't take me seriously. So I can't just yell at him, but I do have to be firm. I don't want to be haunted or crazy. I want them out.

"Now, Weiss."

He removes his face from the pillow and nails me to the floor with just one eye. When he sees how fearful just the eye contact makes me, he adds words. "Shelke… Do you remember…"

I can see where this conversation is going. "Be quiet." I take a brisk walk over to my room.

"The crematorium-"

"No!"

"It's still there." I slam the door on his voice.

* * *

_They brought me to work with them once during the period where I wasn't really going home, or to school. It was a day that neither of them had off and I wasn't about to go to school. They had looked at each other, a bit nervously, before Nero said, "Then you should come with us." _

_"Nero…" _

_"Weiss, it's possible that this could become a career for her anyway. Besides, we _are_ always looking for another person to participate." _

_He breathed a sigh before digging a cigarette out of his pocket. "It's not that I don't agree with you. I just don't want to deal with Rosso." _

_"You'll be fine. Blame it on me if you'd like." _

"_I wouldn't subject you to that." _

"_She'll probably be delighted with some new blood, Weiss. Now lets go." _

_I zipped up my coat and left my backpack in their apartment. We waited around in the alley for a while. While they smoked, I thought about what this career of theirs could possibly be. They had always been very mysterious about it and I never really thought about it. I had gathered it had something to do with fire, of course. _

_After a while, a rusted van pulled up in front of the alley. A woman was driving, but she didn't look at Weiss and Nero. Nonetheless, they both approached the van, so I went with them. Weiss got into the shotgun seat and Nero held open the back door for me. The inside, while dirty and worn, didn't appear to be unsanitary. I sat on the seat and Nero jumped in beside me. _

_The woman driving looked at me in the rearview mirror. "'Bring your daughter to work' day?" _

_"Hardly. Consider her our heiress." Nero put a surreptitious hand on my waist. _

_This didn't sit well with the woman. "I'll need to tell Rosso about this." She reached for a cell phone on the dashboard and Weiss grabbed her hand when she went for it. My spine fused and I felt my posture rise. Nero made a placating noise in the back of his throat. _

_"Please, Argent." He flashed her a smile that Nero and I have dubbed a "razor grin." "There's no need to distress her like that. Now, telling her about the exact reason you were late with your delivery last week…" My eyebrow went up and I tried to make eye contact with Nero, but he just had a small smile. He knew what Weiss was talking about, but at the time I didn't. "That would be something worth raising her blood pressure over, wouldn't you say so?"_

_The driver, Argent, didn't say anything, but she didn't go for the cell phone either. Instead, she just pulled away from the curb and we drove for a while. I must have fallen asleep at some point, because Nero shook me awake. "We're almost there, Shelke." _

* * *

"You're going to talk about that? It could hurt you legally, more than help your sanity."

"Get out." My pen has run out of ink. I reach around under the bed for another one.

Nero kneels down in front of the bed so that he's at eye-level with me. "Shelke, I told you a few nights ago, I would if I could. It's… Well, it's difficult. You'd be a lot more miserable if I weren't here right now."

"Why?"

"Why what?"

Why won't they leave me alone? Why would I be worse off without Nero here? Why can't Weiss just tell me what I need to do to make him leave me alone? I don't say any of this to Nero, almost as a test to see if he truly is a delusion. If he is a delusion, he'd probably be able to read my mind, because he would be a product of my mind. However, he doesn't make any indication of knowing what's going on in my head.

Instead, he lays his head against my knee. I want to ask all those questions. Instead I ask, "What's it like now?"

"Cold," he mutters, staring at the door with vacant eyes. I know I'm not crazy now, because delusions don't have texture to their hair or weight to their heads on your knee. "I've never felt colder. And nothing helps."

* * *

_When I woke up, I wasn't sure exactly where we were. From the front window of the van, I could see that we were inside of a structure, as opposed to on a road. The inside was laden with boxes, stacked up one on top of the other, that Weiss was stretching his legs out on. Argent was pacing around outside of the van. Also, the back door of the van was open. _

_"Where are we?" _

_"On a boat. We'll be approaching the workplace soon." _

_"What's on this boat with us?" _

_A grin stretched across Nero's face. "Nothing really. Some supplies that I'll need to load into this van. You'll need to vacate." I got out of the seat and stretched out my arms. _

_"Weiss, how long was I asleep?" _

_"An hour or so," he replied vaguely. I listen to his bones crack under his skin as he stretches himself out. He went for the van to help Nero load some of the boxes into the back. _

_"Sixty-five minutes," Argent corrected, tapping her watch. "We only have another hour and fifteen minutes. Lets speed it along." _

_"Oh…" I looked at my own watch. It's 10:42. If I had been in school, I would have been in Trigonometry, scribbling graphite onto a piece of paper, absorbing the knowledge therein and replicating it. Instead, I was on a cargo boat with two arsonists and a complete stranger. _

* * *

By the time I've finished writing, my stomach growls. I try to work up the courage to leave my room until I realize that it's ridiculous that I need to do such a thing. Weiss and Nero are either delusions of my grief or ghosts and I don't need to be afraid of them. I push through my door and enter the living room. They're both sitting on the couch, talking.

"I want answers."

"Ask, and you shall receive."

"What are you doing here?"

The corner of Weiss' lip twitches upwards. "We're trying to keep you going, Shelke. We know what happened was necessary, but we were afraid that you might stop if we left you abruptly."

"We're here for you."

"I don't need you. Get out. I'm fine."

Nero rises and guides me over to the couch. "Don't be that way. We all need each other. There are no other people in the world with a bond quite like ours. Shelke, I would go as far as saying that this is as close to love as people like us will ever get."

I'm not crazy like them. I'll accept the fact that I might be a little crazy- Everyone is- but I know I'm not as messed up as Weiss and Nero are. "We… We weren't… We weren't in love. We were never in love."

"Shelke, don't lie. I remember it all." Nero draws me into a hug. I want to scream, but I can't find my breath and I get the feeling no one would hear it anyway. He presses his lips, cold as ice, against my forehead. "We used to kiss sometimes."

"You kissed me. Both of you kissed me." I shiver as Weiss plants his lips over the junction of my neck and shoulder.

"You never pushed me away. You never pushed Weiss away either. At least on the surface, you were in love, Shelke."

"I wasn't."

"You were."

The doorbell rings, followed by a vicious pounding on the door. "Sheeeeeeelke!"

"Oh thank God," I mutter, hopping up from my seat, but somehow Nero is two steps in front of me already. He goes to open the door and his hand touches the doorknob just as mine does. It's not just his lips that are frozen. His fingers are the coldest things I've ever had to touch. Colder than ice. I would place a wager that his hands are colder than liquid nitrogen. He looks down at and shrugs, as if to say, "Have at it, then." He retreats, going back to my room with Weiss in toe.

Hesitantly, I opened the door to reveal a woman in multiple scarves, but also short-shorts. "Shelke, I'm so psyched I caught you!"

In my excitement to get to the door, I hadn't acknowledged exactly whose voice had been permeating the wood. It's Yuffie Kisaragi, local hyperactive fitness nut and the closest thing to my best friend in high school. It's been months since high school.

"… Hello, Yuffie."

"Can I come in?" Normally, the answer would be something in the range of "Absolutely not," but I think that Weiss and Nero won't interrupt us. Besides, she does look very cold. I move aside, letting her inside. "Thanks, it's absolutely freezing out there!"

She sits on the couch. I sit a respectable distance away. The silence is stifling. I don't have a television, otherwise that might be on in order to allieviate some of the awkward tension. Instead, Yuffie speaks first.

"Can I… Can I ask you something?"

"Yes?"

"About… Uh… Listen, I've been hearing some really weird stuff around town. You know how people talk, you know?" I nod. "And… Well… Look, those rumors about you out at that island. People were saying that you were about to-" Yuffie swallows thickly and my hands go rigid. "That wasn't true or anything was it?"

I don't answer her. How does one go about answering a question like that? Especially when Weiss has left my room and is running his fingers along my neck, making me shiver.

"Look, I know that I was a really bad friend when you started skipping school and stuff, but I really want to make it up to you now, by being here for you, you know?"

"Nobody realizes a man is about to jump off a cliff until he's already taken the step. Then everyone swarms. How helpful people like to be when you're already off the edge," Weiss croons.

* * *

_When I got off the boat, I see that mist has settled across a bit of land that I'm unsure of. I want to ask where we are, but I don't think any of them would tell me. I did know that we weren't near the ocean. I would have smelled salt if we were on the shore of the ocean. This was a lake or a river. Also, there were people approaching us. _

_"Who is this?" _

_Nero puts a hand on the small of my back. "Her name is Shelke. She's our protégé. Shelke, this is Rosso de Blangis. She's our… Supervisor, shall we say?" _

_Rosso didn't offer any acknowledgement of my presence, save for nodding at Nero's words. The other person who had accompanied Rosso, a man even taller than Weiss, stays put behind Rosso the entire time. In fact, he only left her side in order to help Weiss and Nero move supplies from the van to someplace rather deep in the woods. Weiss had pulled me aside later and explained that his name was Azul. _

_The six of us managed to make light work of the boxes, settling the crates around a large outdoor fireplace. Aforementioned fireplace was outrageously tall, with a few bricks out of place presumably for the sake of oxygen to continue the burning process, but the pine trees surrounding it concealed it from unwarranted view. All around, the scent of burning wood and decay permeated everything. _

_"Welcome to the job hub," Nero breathed. Argent and Azul began unloading some of the boxes. Gas, I discover. It's a large amount of gasoline. To my right, Weiss and Rosso lugged a longer box. Weiss took a crowbar to it and I couldn't believe what exactly I was seeing. There, in the box, lay a dead man in one of the earlier stages of decomposition and a stab wound directly through his sternum. The stench in the box- formeldahyde and rot- immediately clung to the insides of my nose. I gagged. _

_"She's not cut out for this line of work," Azul rumbled. I coughed. _

_"Leave her be. This is her first exposure to a cadaver, if I'm not mistaken." With all the fright and naïve trust of a paralyzed lamb, I let Nero lead me over to the make-shift coffin to take a closer look. The blood was already dried and stained his clothes and the local bugs were already clamoring around his face. His mouth hung slack-jawed and his eyes stared glassily at me, as if questioning me. _

_"We'll leave you to your work," Azul said, with something that might have been a smirk on any other person, before treading away, Rosso and Argent behind him. _

_"Do you understand now, Shelke?" I shook my head in horror. Weiss continued. "This is how it works: Rosso or Azul run a killer-for-hire service. They're renowned because they never get caught and they never get caught because of me and Nero. They commit the murders and dump the bodies here for us to burn. Argent owns this island (Incidentally, we're in the middle of a lake about three hours from our home) and does the transport work. We burn the evidence and, because there's so many of us, there's no one person to pin any of this to. It's a perfect crime." _

_His last few words, "The perfect crime," echoed in my head as Weiss pulls open the rusted door of the crematorium. _

_"Would you like to set the fire or help Weiss load it in?" I had noticed that there was no, "Get back in the van and pretend this hadn't happened," option. Not that I would have taken it. _

_"I'll set the fire." _

_"Good girl." Nero picked up the man's ankles and Weiss took the doubtlessly cold wrists and they both tossed him into the crematorium. In what probably isn't the proper way to cremate someone, Nero doused the body with the same sort of gasoline that he burned paper with. Weiss broke a relatively thick branch off of a tree and dunked it in the gas tank. He produced a lighter from his coat pocket and flicked it, producing a flame that leapt onto the branch_

_"Just light it up, Shelke." He passed along the makeshift, semi-symbolic torch to me. "The same way you would light anything else." _

_Almost as if it wasn't my own body, I felt my arm mechanically lower the tip of the torch onto the gas-soaked top of the corpse's chest. The flame leapt down onto the man, devouring his body whole-heartedly. The heat intensified the smell of death and carbon that will never leave my airways for as long as I live. _

_"Excellent." In an unusual show of passion, Nero pressed our lips together harshly, as if he were about to be carted off to prison for doing what I had just done. Weiss rewarded me in a similar way, only far more invasive about kissing. _

_To this day, I don't know why I didn't just refuse to participate and walk away. I could say it was the promise of fire. I could say it was because I wanted to be loved. I still don't know, but I'm not the sort of person who would do something like that for love. I am not. _

* * *

"Right, I remember that, now." Weiss locks the door of my bedroom and saunters over to my bed. The streetlights turn him orange, just as they did at his own apartment. I had expected more of an ethereal glow. "That was a while ago."

"Just leave."

"No. You still have a lot of work to do and that therapist woman will ruin everything you've worked for."

"I didn't do any of this. You and Nero did this. I-"

"What? You're a victim? Please, Shelke. You may have set only half the fires, but you took twice the pleasure in it than either me or Nero." He sits on the bed and removes the notebook- an item I had been using as a half-hearted shield- from my grasp and sets it on the floor. "Come here."

"No."

"Are you going to keep up this attitude? We're staying, Shelke. I thought you would actually be happy. You love us, after all."

"No, I don't."

"What would you call it then? You did anything we asked and you were around us almost all the time for the last few weeks of our lives. We kissed, held, touched, what have you, almost every five minutes. You couldn't stand to sleep in a bed without us. You still can't sleep unless one of us is at arm's reach." His evidence is stacked high against my small protests.

"I can still sleep alone."

"Really?" We look at each other, matching glare for glare, until he shrugs and stands. "Have it your way then. Good night, Shelke." With that, he leaves and I settle onto the bed. The clock reads 10:34. I can do this.

* * *

At 11:44, I'm nowhere close to sleeping. I've tried counting, recitation and keeping my mind as blank as new fallen snow. It gets me nowhere. I want to get up and get a sleeping pill, but my pride won't let me. I can sleep without Weiss or Nero or sedatives.

* * *

By 12:35, I'm imagining sleeping, in the hopes that I will be able to fall asleep. I imagine the blissful numbness and lack of awareness that accompany sleep. Then I imagine my subconscious mind being allowed to roam wild with Nero and Weiss in the next room and I snap right awake.

* * *

The glowing 1:39 on my clock demands that I retrieve a sedative. If only to get a few decent hours of sleep. When I wander out, Weiss is tossing lit matches into my sink and Nero sits on the counter, observing the activity with mild interest.

Weiss doesn't even look away from the flames diminishing on the porcelain. "You still can't sleep, can you?" I don't answer him. "Just eat your words. You can't live without us."

"I can so." I drown the purple pill in water and go back to my own room to let the pill take its effect.

* * *

At a solid 3 AM, I slink defeated into the living room. Nero is asleep with his head on the back of the couch and Weiss is just staring off into space. I stare blearily at him until he notices me. When he does, he smiles. It's not even a taunting smile. "Yes, Shelke?"

"I can't sleep."

"I thought that might be the case."

"You win… You win…" I collapse onto the couch, the side of my head resting on his thigh. "You win." I want to start crying but I'm too exhausted to even do that. Instead my breath comes out as heavy sighs. Weiss, being who he is and understanding me the way that he does, pushes his fingers through my hair.

"So what exactly do you want? I can't bring you two back to life. It's impossible."

"I know. Shelke, do you know how we died, exactly?"

"No."

"We jumped in. We wanted to see hell itself." As if it's a bedtime story, Weiss continues the soothing petting of my hair as my sleep-deprived mind processes their suicide. "We lit it up and climbed inside. Do you remember now?"

"My notebook." I try to raise my body from the couch, because this is something that needs to be written down. It comes out as more of a drunken slur. The sedative is finally taking its affect, or perhaps the only true sedative at work is the presence of Weiss and Nero.

"Sleep." The hand in my hair gently presses me back down onto the couch. "I'll recount the entire thing for you if you sleep." As I drift into a peaceful oblivion, I hear him mutter, "After all, I want you wide awake for when you join us."

* * *

TBC....

* * *

ASDFJKL;!!! WEISS YOU CREEPY MAN!!!

If I've stepped on any characterization toes in the more affectionate scenes, and I get the feeling that I have, please do forgive me and tell me so I can make scrapes at fixing it.

Happy Halloween, guys! :D


	4. Chapter 4

Haven't written anything in AGES, but I'm glad to be back.

Thank you's go out to: My big sister, who gave me a bunch of Dresden Dolls music that really helped, and ReadingChick, who betaed this for Shelke's voicing.

Disclaimer: I don't own Dirge of Cerberus.

* * *

I open my eyes and stare across from the couch in a daze. My mind recounts details to me slowly. Incineration, sedatives, dependency. Everything is blurred into Weiss' soothing tones, murmuring, "I want you awake for when you join us." I experience a rush of clarity and pull my head off the couch. They want me to join them. They want me dead.

Will I join them? A week ago, I would have said no. Of course not. I have no wish to die and dying with them is absurd. But, with this level of dependence on them, I don't believe my mind will let me live without them. Perhaps this is why I created these delusions; To keep myself alive. But now, knowing that my psyche is on the more fragile side of breaking without them…

I would have never contemplated something like this before. "You're being ridiculous," I say aloud, into the empty apartment. I have to hear it resonate, at least for a moment, before being absolutely certain that it's me and not Nero or Weiss.

"Did you know," Nero asked, rounding a corner with a book in his hand, "That the brain signals love emits have a pattern similar to mental illness? Perhaps you truly are insane, dear Shelke."

"I know I'm not insane."

"Then you are in love."

"We have already established that."

"Indeed we have." Nero closes the book (A novel from my room) and sets it on the coffee table. "Has Weiss told you his intentions?"

"For my death?"

"Yes. Do you want to do it?"

I burn holes in the carpet with my eyes to avoid watching him sit next to me. "I don't know. I am divided on the matter." Nero presses his cold lips to my neck, prompting a shiver. I don't wrench away though. There's no point.

"It… Doesn't hurt after a while." I look at him. I can't tell if he's talking about dying or the state he's in now. "It's as if…" Nero stares into the depths of the coffee table, taking in all the burn marks that weren't there yesterday. "As if you stop simply being in a fire. Suddenly, you _are_ fire. Light and pure, but powerful enough to blacken anything you choose."

He must be talking about dying now. "How did you become like this then? A…" I feel as if ghost is the inappropriate word, but nothing else really fits.

"Weiss and I had no wish to leave you. We still love you."

"So it's your wish for me to die as well?"

"I never said that. I… I'm uncertain as to what I hope to accomplish by staying here, but I do know that if I had left you alone with Weiss, you would have been dead by now." Nero takes a deep breath that he doesn't really need and takes one of my hands. Deathly cold though they are, I don't pull away from the contact. "Weiss is quite selfish. He doesn't want to let go of you, ever. Dying is a form of losing you because you will move on. If he stays here, haunting you forever, then he won't lose but he won't truly possess you and he will not have won."

"By joining you two in the afterlife he will have me."

"And he will have won," Nero concludes. "And typically, no one would want to die and be won over by a phantom of their lover. But your sanity is quite dependent on him giving you peace."

"And you." I have no doubt that if Nero had been absent when I went out to the couch, I would not have fallen asleep.

"And me."

"Nero…"

Nero looks up and, even though his eyes are lackluster, they still silence me effectively. He puts an arm around me, pulling me into his cold embrace and presses his lips to mine. When he pulls away, I can feel myself shaking.

"Shelke, your happiness is something that Weiss isn't paying attention to. My wish is for you to be happy, but I also want you to be with me." He pauses. "I do wonder which desire is stronger." With that, Nero leaves me shaking on the couch, picks up my book and walks back to my bedroom. Before he closes the door, he pokes his head back into the room. "By the by, Miss Kisaragi is coming up the stairs. She will be knocking on the door in around 30 seconds."

* * *

"So, I say to him," Yuffie garbles, taking another bite of fruit salad and gesturing wildly with her fork, "I say, 'Vincent has free incoming calls, so I c-' Uhm, Shelke?"

I stop examining the dregs of my coffee and look up to her confused face. "Yes?"

"Wow, you're really out of it. You okay?"

Typically, my lack of response would be a result of insomnia, but honestly I'm reacting more or less to the shock of Yuffie coming by my house twice in two days. And this time, we're actually outside, in a café. The sunlight is a bit painful, reflecting off the snow.

"Yes."

"Good. Look, Shelke?" I look up to see a grave expression on her usually excited face. As she fiddles with her fork, she says, "You can talk to me, you know that, right? About, like, anything? I mean, I may not get it, but I'll listen if you want to talk. You know that right?"

"Yes. Thank you."

"No problem." Instantly, the mood lightens again as Yuffie smiles and drops another grape into her mouth.

" Yuffie?"

"Yeah?"

"What month is it?"

"It's almost March! I hate all this snow all over the place, but, you know. Whatever!" Yuffie pops another spoonful of fruit into her mouth. "It's almost my half-birthday."

"Really?"

"Yeah. You'd never know it, from all this snow all over the place, right?" The snow comes up to my mid-shin when it's piled up on the sidewalk. I was expecting it to be more around mid-January. "It sucks, I wanna go to the beach!" Yuffie whines a bit.

She's rambling at this point and I watch her. It's difficult to know how to respond. Is she venting? Does she expect me to join her in her verbal disdain of everything slick and frozen? Does she want me to fix these problems for her? Or is she trying to make conversation?

Weiss, Nero and I rarely had this problem. We were all very quiet.

"Hey, Shelke?"

"Yes?"

"You okay? You're still kinda distant."

"I'm fine."

"Oooh, I know what it is!" She grins triumphantly.

"What?"

"You're thinking about a guy."

The situation is laughable, really. "You could say that."

"I knew it! It's the guy who smokes right? That's why your place smells like cigarettes right now, right? And why that ashtray is there, right?"

This is just the epitome of black humor. "Yes. That's why." With her fork hanging out of her mouth, Yuffie digs around in her bag and surfaces with a small purple tube.

"Take this."

"What is it?"

She pops it into my hand. "It's lipgloss." I examine it. I've never worn make-up in my life but I can still identify it as lipgloss. What I actually wanted to know was why she gave it to me. "Trust me, it's how I got Vincent Valentine to call me last year."

"He called you because you stole his coat and he wanted it back."

Yuffie waves her hand spastically in the air. "Details, details… The important thing is that he called me and it's because of this stuff, I swear." I move my hand across the table to deposit the lipgloss on her side of the table but Yuffie pushes my hand back. "Take it! Trust me, whatever you were thinking about will totally be resolved when you wear that. I promise."

I doubt that cosmetics were going to solve my problem, but the gesture meant something to me. I almost tell her about Weiss and Nero, the fact that they're in my apartment, waiting for me to come back. I want to tell her about the fires and the corpses and the things I've done. I refrain from doing so. Instead, I put the gloss in my pocket.

* * *

After my visit with Yuffie, I had passed out immediately upon entering the apartment. I wake up to the sound of my name. "Shelke? Wake up, Shelke. Come on, get up." I open my eyes. It's dark in the apartment, indicating the evening had descended while I was asleep. A cursory glance at the clock tells me it's 8:34. Weiss is leaning against the end table.

"What is it, Weiss?"

"Get up and get dressed, okay?" He looks excited, almost as excited as when we'd go to set fires to something alive. "I have something for us to do, and it's important, but we need to go now." Anything that Weiss wants done will not be good for me in the long run. I stare blankly at him. He tries a different tactic. "We can do this one of two ways. You can be good and get up, or we'll drive you absolutely insane. In the worst way. You'll never sleep again. Now get up."

I get up and put on a coat. Weiss follows me out the door. We walk for hours, Weiss in the lead, through the winding streets of the city until we get to a long stretch of road that leads out into the woods. Considering the time and who exactly is leading me, I don't want to enter, but I plow forward, regardless of my own wants at this point. Weiss is the only one who matters.

I don't know how far into the woods we walked, but eventually we came across a tank of kerosene and a book of matches. Neither of them are mine, but there is a trail of kerosene leading out from a small hand-dug pool into an entirely different direction. He wants me to burn something.

"No."

"If you'll recall, I won yesterday. You said that you could sleep without me and you were wrong. Now you have to do what I say. Light the match and drop it, Shelke."

"I refuse."

"Shelke, this is the second-to-last burning you'll ever have to do in your life. Strike the match. Drop it on the trail. By the time we leave, the house will have burned down to the foundation."

"A house?" We are about to destroy someone's house?

"They're already dead, Shelke. This is just clean-up. Please? For me?"

Weiss places the box in my hands and loops his arms around my waist, drawing me close to him. My head suddenly feels foggy. He grips my hips, his fingertips digging into the bones, as I drag the red-tipped match against the rough side of the box. I hesitate for a second, watching the flame consume the wood. We've never made physical contact during a burning.

"Do it."

I drop the match into the small pool and, as I do so, Weiss tilts my face upwards to look at him. He brings his lips to mine and kisses me harshly, hungrily. After we pull away, we watch the fire flare up and start to consume the trail. Weiss removes his hand from my body and begins walking away as the trail proceeds deeper into the woods. I follow behind him, walking at double my usual speed.

When we're almost out of the woods, a high-pitched shriek fills the night that blurs my vision and sends shivers coursing through my body. All I can think is, "I've killed someone. I'm a murderer."

* * *

I wake up in my bed with no memory of getting into the bedroom, the apartment or even the city limits. Shifting my head to the side, I see Nero seated on the floor, with his back against the bed, flicking a lighter. He draws sparks, but no flames.

Flames. Screams. I've killed someone.

"Nero," I groan quietly. He looks up in my direction and abandons the lighter, dropping it onto the floor with a clatter. "Nero, I've killed someone."

"Yes. Go speak with Weiss. He's waiting out in the living room for you."

"Nero…"

"Shelke, I know. And I know it hurts but this is just one more thing to bring you closer to us. One last step," he murmurs. "Go speak to Weiss."

I look to my bedroom door and my blood makes several changes; Lava, ice water and cement seem to inhabit it within a few moments of each other. I pull myself off the bed and leave Nero to his lighter.

"Shelke," Nero calls softly before I open the door.

"Yes?"

"I know what I want now. I want to be with you forever. I know that you're only happy and stable with me, and I would do anything for that. Even if it hurts you, I know you need me."

"And Weiss."

"And Weiss," he amends. "Go to him."

* * *

"Took you long enough."

"Who were they?"

"The people we killed?" Weiss lights a cigarette. "Rosso and Azul. You should feel special. You're the last one alive who knows about that island now."

"And Argent?"

"She's drowned herself," Nero replies, coming out of my room and shutting the door behind him.

Weiss tosses the pack of cigarettes to Nero, which he catches one-handed and effortlessly. "I think she was trying to distance herself from us. We died in a fire, so she died in water. Pointless, though. We're all murderers, so we're all going to the same place."

"You said you didn't kill people," I shakily say, sitting on the couch next to Weiss.

"I said it wasn't my job. I never said it didn't happen. What do you think happened to the men who molested me and Nero?"

Recoiling in shock would be overkill, so I settle for just sitting a tad straighter. I should have guessed that would have been their ends. The casual air of his voice is what makes the statement disturbing.

"Now what?"

"Now it's time for you to leave."

I have to actually look at him to make absolutely certain that Nero is the one who said that. He's staring down in my direction with a cigarette hanging loosely between his lips. He seems to be looking through me rather than at me.

"Leave?"

"We need you with us," Weiss says, taking my hand in his. "We've missed you so terribly, Shelke."

"I don't want to die."

"Don't consider it dying. Consider it crossing over a bridge."

"You've never liked being here anyway." Nero sits on the other side of me and takes my other hand. "You've always hated people and the state of the world. We're opening a door for you to leave it forever."

"You have nothing left."

"That's not true."

"What do you have then?" Nero asks.

Who do you have then?" Weiss lays a kiss on my cheek. "Yuffie, who only wants to be around you because you're interesting now?" He places another one on my neck. "Your parents and sister who never talk to you?" Very quickly, another one on my lips. "Your therapist who only cares about you because she's getting paid to care?" Weiss looks me straight in the eyes. "You have no one."

To my look of horror, Nero kisses my lips quickly. "Except for us. We would never leave you."

"I…"

"Get your jacket on. Or leave it off. But we are leaving. Now."

"Where?"

"To the crematorium, of course."

* * *

_As this will be my last journal entry, my last will and testament, I would like to confess what I have done._

_I am in love with Weiss and Nero Eldritch. I have been since I've known them, but not since we met. It was not love at first sight and I want that to be explicitly clear. _

_The night of my conviction, I had received a phone call from Nero, asking me to come to the crematorium, saying that he needed to see me. Static had cut off the rest of the call, but Nero tells me now that he wanted to see me, "one last time." I took a bus the three hours out and found a row-boat (that the police had later identified as belonging to Argent Palmer) and rowed towards the island. _

_Once I was there, I treaded the path to the crematorium and heard screaming. When I went to the door, I could see Weiss' eyes peering out. Thinking they had locked themselves in somehow (though, in retrospect, it never could have been an accident), I picked up Nero's abandoned cell phone and called the ambulance. _

_I tugged on the door, recklessly burning my hands, and promptly realized that it was locked. Weiss and Nero lit the crematorium, crawled inside and locked the door. They committed suicide by fire. _

_I remember trying to speak to them while they were inside. I remember saying, "I'm sorry," and, "Please don't leave me." I remember screaming desperate pleas for them to leave the flames. The last thing I remember were the paramedics, pulling me away from the door as Weiss and Nero's bodies burned. _

_Since then, they have haunted me. They have invaded my home and, as I begged, have left the flames and will not leave me. They wish to be with me forever and, lacking a stable mind without them, I will go with them. _

_Please tell Shalua I'm sorry for not being a normal sister. Please tell my parents I'm sorry for not being a normal daughter. Please tell Yuffie that there was nothing she could have done. _

_~ Shelke Rui_

_

* * *

_THIS IS NOT THE END! Stay tuned for the final chapter and epilogue!


	5. Chapter 5

Everything passes by quickly on the deserted bus that I've found myself strapped onto. I barely remember getting on. I do remember accidently asking for three tickets instead of just one. I had shaken my head and only asked for one after that lapse, correcting myself. The man behind the counter handed me the ticket with a raised eyebrow. After that, all I can recall is Weiss sitting to my left, Nero sitting to my right and a long stretch of black forest moving past the bus quickly.

"These next few hours are going to be bizarre, Shelke, so pay attention." I'm going to die. People die every day and I don't need advice on how to do it. I concentrate on what's in my pockets: A lighter and Yuffie's lip-gloss in my coat pocket. My cell phone, the bus ticket and my wallet in my jeans pocket. I don't have my house keys though. Nero threw those in the garbage when we left. "You aren't coming back," he had said.

"It's going to hurt a lot and you're going to change your mind almost immediately, but don't stop."

"Locking the door helps," Nero adds. "We'll even hold it for you."

"It's good to focus on something else while you're burning up." Weiss puts his feet up on the chair in front of him and starts ticking methods off on his fingers. "Count backwards from 300 in multiples of three, think of all the colors you've ever known, recite the names of everyone in your cell phone. Things that require your utmost concentration will usually get you through the surface burns."

"Deeper burns are harder, because you're not used to having those nerves hurt, but most of the surface damage has already been accompl-"

"Stop." I half-expect the trees moving outside the window to stop moving when I say it. I almost expect the air to stop moving in the bus. That is how unreal the experience of being bused to my own suicide feels. Instead, all that happens is that the bus driver looks at me in the rear-view mirror before returning his gaze to the road.

Weiss lays a hand on top of my head, moving his fingers through my hair, slowly. It sends the worst sort of shivers down my spine. "Okay. We'll stop. I'm just excited. I can't wait for you to be with us."

"We'll be completed, Shelke." On my other side, Nero kisses my hand. "You don't know what that will do. We'll be as one, together, for eternity."

"Everything will be a fire forever, Shelke. Isn't that what you've always wanted? To always be strong and never have to be weak ever again? To take everything into you and leave it changed in your wake?"

"All I want is to be sane again." I pick my feet off the floor and scrunch up into my seat. That's a lie; the white lie of omission. I want to be sane and, to be sane, I need to be with Weiss and Nero. Therefore, all I want is to be with them. They both know this. That's why this is even happening.

"You're tired," Nero murmurs, pulling my head to his shoulder. "Get some rest, hm? We'll be at the stop in a few hours. We'll wake you."

I don't think about much as I'm drifting off. There's really nothing left to think about.

* * *

True to his word, Nero wakes me up five minutes before the bus screeches to a halt. I step off and begin walking, Weiss and Nero always half a step in front. The lake stretches out into the horizon in front of them. The situation feels even more dreamlike than before. Twenty silent minutes later, we reach the shore. The water moves like an ocean but smells like trash. The island where the crematorium lies is fifty feet away.

I have no intention to swim across and there's no boat present. Crossing the blurry line from specter to delusion, Nero reads my mind and points to a small row boat. It makes sense. Before, we would take larger boats. Without multiple bodies to incinerate, there's no need for a large vessel. I sit down and take up the oars.

Nero pushes the boat out into the water and glances at the oars I'm laboring on. "I would have done that for you."

I will not rise to this. I continue rowing.

"There's no need to be so grim, Shelke." Weiss' eyes gleam with pleasure. He's rarely ever looked more pleased. "You should be happy. You're going to be with us forever."

Nero keeps his eyes on me. Silent me. I keep rowing.

* * *

When we disembark, Weiss leads the way into the woods. I trail behind him and Nero follows behind me. We walk down the dirt pathway, leading down into the blackness of the woods. Progressively, the trees get thicker and thicker and eventually they thin out until we reach a clearing that's all too familiar.

The crematorium sits plainly in the center. It looks like it hasn't been touched by human hands since Weiss and Nero's deaths. The gas can is still next to the door. The only difference between then and now is that the door is half-open, waiting for another body to be fed in. My body. With a detached numbness that always came with burning a body, I remove my jacket, toss it to the side, load some wood into the crematorium, and drench it with gasoline. I pour the gasoline over my own clothes.

"Good girl," Weiss murmurs, throughout the entire process. "Very good." I stand before him, drenched with the acrid fluids. A sacrifice to his madness, you could say. "Go get your lighter."

I walk over to where I had cast my jacket and grasp smooth plastic inside. I draw out what I thought had been my lighter, but instead is Yuffie's gloss. I slip that into my jeans pocket and grab the lighter. I straighten up with the burning sensation of tears behind my eyes.

"You're doing the right thing, Shelke," Weiss breathed from behind me, laying an arm across my front in an embrace. "All of this is perfect, just think about it."

"I am thinking about it."

"No, you're thinking about the path." Weiss extends the arm holding me so that I can see his hand. "I'm thinking of the destination." He grips it back into a fist and pulls me against him again. "You and Nero and I. Eternal. Forever. We can burn the town to the ground if we'd like, Shelke. That's how powerful we are when we're together. There is nothing more powerful than the bond that we three share, Shelke. Nothing."

Nero, leaned against the door of the crematorium, says nothing. He just eyes the lighter in my hands. Knowing Nero, he probably wants to be the one to turn the wheel and ignite me. Weiss won't allow him though. To Weiss, this is a conquest. This is seeing how far he can bend my will around him. And it's worked. Weiss has gotten me to kill two people and burn countless bodies. He got me to come down to a deserted crematorium to end my life. Weiss has won.

"Time's up, Shelke. Get inside and we'll go along with you." I turn around and walk past Weiss and up to the crematorium. Nero still blocks the door.

"Nero, let me through."

He sighs, shakes his head and says, "I can't let you do this."

"Excuse me?"

"All of this isn't right. Shelke, you can't do this."

All at once, Weiss is up with us, to my right, standing slightly closer to Nero than I am. I can feel his anger pulsating off his body. "Nero!"

"Weiss, it's over. This can't happen. It needs to stop." Nero is a melancholic sort of calm. Not resigned in the slightest, though. I've never actually seen Nero stand up to Weiss, though I would imagine it had to have happened sometimes. Maybe Nero had even resisted dying, like I am. "We can't kill her like this."

"Nero, I know it's hard to watch her do this." Weiss runs a hand along Nero's cheek. An intimate gesture, I've seen Weiss perform it a thousand times and I've had it performed on me a thousand more. "It was hard for me to watch you burn, but it needs to be done. She needs to be with us. She can't exist any other way. We're all she has left now."

"No, we're all she _had_. We died. We abandoned her because we thought we could gain power from dying. We thought we were too good for this world and maybe we were right. But Shelke is in this world and she needs to stay in it. Imagine what it will do to her family, her friends."

"Her family has forsaken her and so have her friends!" Weiss pins Nero by his shoulders against the crematorium. "We are all she has."

"If we are the only ones, then she has no one." Nero cranes his head up, matching Weiss glare for glare. "If she had no one, then she would have overdosed herself on those pills of hers long before we ever got to her. Shelke still has people to live for."

"So you would rather she stay here than with us? You don't love her, then, it seems," Weiss hisses, almost mockingly. "Otherwise, you'd want her with us all the time and that would be that."

"No, Weiss. It's not that I love her so much that I want her with me all the time. I love Shelke enough to the point where I'm willing to be away from her if it will make her well. I am determined to make her sane, but killing her is not the way to go about it."

All of this time, I'm thinking. Parents who would work 100-hour work weeks for the sake of their daughter. Sisters standing by on the sidelines to see if someone can pull herself out of a trench and lending a helping hand wherever they can. Pulling a friend out of her own hell to bask in mid-March sunlight.

The world is in hell, and I am in the world. I was molested when I was five, half-abandoned by nine, met two arsonists when I was 18 and doused myself in gasoline, ready to spin a wheel with my thumb and end my life. But I'm still thinking of who I would leave behind. Mom, Dad, Shalua, my boss, my coworkers, Yuffie.

My fingers brush across the plastic tube in my jean pocket. Yuffie's words come back to me through the haze. _"Trust me, whatever you were thinking about will totally be resolved when you wear that. I promise." _

Acting on the same sort of instinct that makes children believe in fairytales and wondering why I'm relying on that sort of logic now, I take the tube out of my pocket. Keeping my eyes locked on the still-arguing Weiss and Nero, slick some of the stuff across my lips. It's slimy, warm and tastes like blueberries.

"Weiss…" His name crawls out of my lips. They both swivel their heads towards me. "You know that you and Nero are the only two people I could ever love this way."

"Yes, of course I do."

"And Nero?"

"Y-Yes?" His voice isn't hesitant, just questioning.

"Then you know that I can't do this. I'm sorry. I can't die for you, but I will gladly live for you." I stand up on the tips of my toes and plant a single kiss to his cheek. For a second, absolutely nothing happens. Then his cheek, the shiny spot where I had laid my lips, starts smoking around the edges, as if his skin was evaporating.

Weiss didn't seem to realize it at first but, when it spread to his mouth, slightly agape in confusion, he placed two fingertips to his mouth and found it disintegrating. "Sh-Shelke?"

Nero nods. "I see. Your will desire this world, but you needed help."

The disintegration spreads faster over time. Weiss' entire left side has disappeared. The initial mark had been only about an inch in diameter, but it had slowly spread. "Shelke, I'm…"

Nero gives me a sad smile. "One last kiss, and it's over, hm?" I nod. "Very well." Nero takes my shoulders and wipes a tear away. "Shelke, stop crying. It's all over, darling."

"Traitor," Weiss' half-mouth breathes.

"I'll be with you momentarily, Weiss, just wait." Nero grasps my shoulders, squeezing. "You have a world to live in, Shelke. Make the best of it." Nero lays his lips across mine and I feel a tear stream down my face as I try to savor his mouth on mine. When he pulls away, his lips are leaving him, but his voice resonates in my head. "I love you. I never said it enough, but it's true. Perhaps it's the only true thing of this world, our love for you, but I'm counting on you to make more genuine things here. Then come to us when you're ready."

It might have been the mental taxation of having the only two people I've ever loved evaporate before my eyes, but I fall into a dead faint.

* * *

When I wake, I feel empty and cold. Weiss and Nero have long since left and, this time, they aren't coming back for me. The forest all around me is black and silent. For the first time in months, I am truly alone. Trancelike, the first thing I do is find my phone. I scroll down through the contacts and find a number I haven't called in months. With shaking fingers, I press 'Send' and wait.

About five rings later, a bleary "Hello," makes it's way from the speaker into my ear. I'm so shocked that she picks up, she has to say, "Hello? Who is this?" before I speak.

"Shalua…"

"Shelke?!" The sound of someone hurriedly getting up, probably throwing her glance to an alarm clock. "Shelke, it's three in the morning, where are you?"

"The island where they found me. I-I took a bus." I feel my jeans pocket for the ticket. "From Carsine's Station to Foggy Island. Can you…" I inhale, exhale. "Weiss and Nero are gone finally. Can you come get me?"

"Weiss? But… That place where you- Yeah. Yeah, I'll come get you. Just stay right there. Don't move. I'll come get you. Do you need the police or-?"

"Yes. I'm sorry, Shalua."

"It's… It's alright. Shelke. Just… Just stay there. I'm coming for you, okay?"

"Okay. I'm sorry."

"It's okay. Everything will be okay, Shelke. Just don't leave. I'm going to come for you. Okay?"

"Okay." I hang up first. The realization comes slowly. Weiss and Nero are gone. They aren't ever coming back. It ends the nightmare, certainly, but it ends the other things too. It ends the nights of staring at the fires we started, hard embraces that could break me and ephemeral kisses.

I curl up against the crematorium door and cry harder than I had ever imagined crying. That's how Shalua and the police officer found me.

* * *

Two Years Later…

I stretch my fingers up to the sky, trying to alleviate the tightness in my vertebrae. I had gotten rather fired up about the essay and spent the better part of two hours getting my thoughts out on the matter. Yuffie, in the corner, has already gone off to sleep. College nightlife has certainly taken it out of her.

As a student at Midgar College, I have very little time to dwell on Weiss and Nero. I hadn't thought of them much at all, actually. Therapy had taught me to let go and, slowly but surely, I was getting the hang of it. So, imagine my surprise when I change into my pajamas to go to sleep and Nero is sitting, cross-legged on my bed. Translucent, but still present.

"No," I whisper. He holds up a hand.

"I'm not here to harm you anymore, Shelke. What's done is done. I just came to say goodbye."

"How can I be certain?"

With a wry smile, Nero holds out his arm, displaying how I can see my floor through his wrist. "I'm incorporeal. I can do nothing in this world. I am only here to take my final leave."

Wearily, I look around the dim room. "Where is Weiss?"

"He is, ah… Being judged."

"The afterlife then?"

Nero shakes his head. "I can't tell you much about that. Only that I was judged and my punishment is similar to Weiss'. After all, we were not supposed to interfere here as much as we had."

"There is little left to say after what has happened."

"So I've seen. Juvenile corrections facility, therapist's office, police department. Our story has been told to quite a few people, hm?"

"The therapist said that telling everyone was important."

"Perhaps. There is still unfinished business between us. Your feelings remain ambivalent."

"There is no ambivalence. I loved you."

"You have moved on. Or perhaps I have." Nero chuckles at the tiny joke. He gets up and crosses the room to meet me. He peers at my desk, taking in the books. "Psychology?"

"I have experience in that field."

"You know how the offices look, at least." A wry smile crosses his features, before switching to a look of alarm. "Weiss…"

"What?"

Weiss steps through the wall with a shell-shocked expression. "How… Did it go?"

"Same place, different sentence, you could say." Weiss looks at me, then looks away. "We need to leave soon. We're being watched to make sure we don't do anything here."

"Of course."

Nero leaves the desk and joins Weiss. He eyes Weiss, as if waiting for something. Weiss looks at him, at me, then back at the wall. Nero's eyes narrow in warning. I watch the whole exchange from my desk. Finally, Weiss approaches me.

"I…" His voice fails him. I stand.

"I understand. I don't forgive you yet, but I understand your motives."

Weiss nods and attempts to pull me into an embrace. He is, like Nero, incorporeal. He looks at his own arm with a scowl.

"When I'm with you, you can do that."

"Fine. I'll be waiting."

* * *

FINAL EPILOGUE TO COME.


	6. Epilogue

EPILOGUE

Death wasn't as I had expected. I don't think I had been expecting anything, but it was far less painful than I imagined. It was stagnation for a little while, probably until the funeral. After that, I was vaulted into a hazy state of existence. My identity, Shelke Rui, had been stripped away, leaving me just as I was on the inside. My consciousness and mind remained, even though my body had faded.

"Welcome home." Warm, smooth feelings enveloped me, as inviting as they had been all those years ago.

"We've been waiting." The cool authoritative tone hasn't lost its appeal.

I've missed them.

END

Thanks to everyone who stayed with me and everyone who helped me with inspiration when my muses were on vacation! Stay tuned for another Dirge fic, epic in length.


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